Let's Brew Wednesday - 1856 Devenish Store Beer

Yet another Strong Ale recipe. You may have noticed a theme. All to do with my new book, obviously.

I look back at some brewing records – mostly the totally handwritten ones – and think: “How the hell did I ever make any sense out of that?”

I had that in spades with the Devenish records. Luckily, I’d already transcribed most of the information years ago. And not really done anything with it until now.

Given its name, I think it’s fair to assume that it was meant to be aged. Which is why I’ve knocked the FG down from the racking gravity. A secondary fermentation – with Brettanomyces playing a leading role – would have slowly worked its way through the stuff Saccharomyces couldn’t handle.

The brewing record contains no details of the hops, other than the quantity. It’s not the most expansive of documents.

1856 Devenish Store Beer
mild malt	18.75 lb	100.00%
Goldings 60 mins	2.75 oz
Goldings 20 mins	2.75 oz
Goldings dry hops	1.00 oz
OG	1086
FG	1020
ABV	8.73
Apparent attenuation	76.74%
IBU	45
SRM	8
Mash at	155º F
Sparge at	178º F
Boil time	60 minutes
pitching temp	60º F
Yeast	Wyeast 1099 Whitbread Ale

This recipe is in my two new books, Strong! vols. 1 & 2 and Strong! vol.2.